With his car bearing a scheme to promote Batman flick The Dark Knight Rises, Dale Earnhardt Jr. emerged from the darkness of a 143-race losing streak and triumphed at Michigan International Speedway last summer. Since then, Earnhardt has not returned to Victory Lane in the Sprint Cup Series – a problem he hopes to correct this weekend on MIS’ two-mile oval in a car that’s promoting the latest Superman film, Man of Steel.
Earnhardt is also hoping to start regaining ground in the Sprint Cup standings as well. While he’s solidly in a Chase spot right now at fourth in the table, he’s fallen off since charging to the points lead on the strength of five consecutive Top-10 finishes to start the 2013 season. His third-place run at Pocono last weekend was his first Top-5 finish in the last nine races, and he sits 82 points behind Hendrick Motorsports teammate and championship leader Jimmie Johnson.
“We talked about it last week after the race, but we kind of had some misses here lately and not many hits,” Earnhardt said at MIS. “As far as showing up to the race track and being competitive and getting the job done putting together a full weekend, we haven’t been able to do that. We started the season off so promising – the best that I had ever started a season.
“It just seemed like things were going so perfectly and it’s the way it is in this sport: You will think you have everything going in the right direction and then odds and fate and everything else [gets] in the way.”
Earnhardt feels that his team has been working hard towards returning to more consistent performances like they had at the start of the year. But in his mind, there are still “some holes to fill” as they look to catch up with stablemate Johnson – and nothing less than becoming a regular contender for wins will do.
“We want to win more races,” Earnhardt said. “We want that to be the status quo. We want that to be the norm.”
